Chapter 205

At this time, the naval battle is like a megalodon facing a dozen whales, looking at it as an enemy, it will be more than lucky. However, every time the megalodon opens its bloody mouth, it will bite the whale bloody.

This is the case with this new warship of the Ning Navy, don't look at his naval guns, there are only twenty-four guns in total, of which there are eight on the left and right sides, four on the fore main deck, two on the second deck, and two on the aft deck. Compared with the Europa battleship, which has dozens of guns at every turn, it is simply an unpopular class.

However, it is such an inaccessible battleship, the firepower is unusually ferocious, and the rate of fire of the guns is also extremely fast, there is no way to be the rate of fire of the rear-loading guns, of course, the Europa battleship will also be equipped with some Franc aircraft rear-loading guns, which are used for close-range bombardment.

The rate of fire of the Franc machine is also very fast, if it is equipped with enough sub-guns, at least in the artillery sequence of the Ning Navy, it can shoot thirteen shells in almost a minute, this speed is nothing in the artillery army of later generations, but in this era, the rate of fire is a little scary.

"Bagaya Road, doesn't it mean that the country's sailors have been abolished, and even pirates can't beat them? What's going on with this battleship? ”

Morimoto grabbed a guy dressed as a Han man next to him and asked with a roar, "Why are you lying to me!" ”

"I ...... I don't know...... I ......"

Without waiting for him to finish explaining, Morimoto couldn't hold back any longer, and quickly pulled out his katana and slashed horizontally, and the Han man's head floated out like a balloon in a somersault, bringing a rain of blood: "Your conscience is great...... Broken! ”

Although they are retreating rapidly, Morimoto is like falling into an ice cellar for a long time, they still have thirteen blacktail ships at this time, it can be said that the strength is still there, but what can the strength be? On the sea to the south is Zheng Zhilong's territory, and they can't rob it.

Otherwise, those who bought Zheng Zhilong's protection money would settle accounts with Zheng Zhilong, Zheng Zhilong would not bird those small businessmen, but in these years, those who dare to be maritime merchants have no small businessmen, they are all people with huge abilities and backgrounds behind them, and Zheng Zhilong can't afford to offend.

Therefore, Zheng Zhilong's only way is that whoever dares to make trouble on his territory, he will kill whomever he wants, just like Liu Xiang, you must know that Liu Xiang is one of the eighteen Zhizhi maritime groups, with more than 600 ships, including more than 20,000 sailors and pirates. He was also forced to jump into the sea by Zheng Zhilong.

Yang Tiansheng, Yang Liu, Yang Qi, Zhong Bin, and Li Kuiqi, one of the eighteen Zhi of the year, were captured by Zheng Zhilong, and Liu Xiang was forced to commit suicide.

Of course, Zheng Zhilong can't fight a land war, but it is more than enough to dominate Nanyang. There is no way to survive in Nanyang, but now there is a Ning Navy sailor in the north of the Ming Dynasty, and there is no hope that he can no longer plunder the coast like in the Jiajing period, and in order to buy this tattered fleet, he even smashed the coffin into it, owed a lot of debts, and fled back empty-handed, and the creditors didn't eat them?

At this time, Li Zhixiang was no longer fighting alone, as a new ship sea trial, it was naturally impossible to go to sea alone, he was actually followed by more than 30 gunboats, these gunboats were too slow to keep up.

With the fierce artillery battle between this new ship and the pirates, these four hundred small gunboats followed, Morimoto looked at the more than thirty gunboats chasing after him for a long time, although the distance was too far to see the true size of these gunboats, he was still glad that he survived this time and escaped quickly, otherwise it would be a big trouble.

At this moment, the battleship of the Ning Navy hit the fifth shell, which hit a gunboat called "Ma Yun", which was a directly subordinate Wuwei ship of Kato Kashige.

Kato was fortunate that the cannon did not hit the deck, but because of the undulations of the waves, the trajectory of the cannon was changed, and the shell actually flew over the top of the "Ma Yun" and exploded about five feet from the deck, that is, nearly a third of the main mast.

The violent explosion broke the main mast of the Ma Yun, and the loss of two-thirds of the mast meant that the Ma Yun almost lost the kinetic energy to move forward.

Now, they don't have a chance.

Shigeji Kato was forced into a hurry, and he rejected his retainer's proposal to let him escape in a lifeboat, and instead ordered: "Fight back to the death!" ”

Because they know that they can't escape, if Europa's warships, they will raise the white flag and surrender, but the problem is that Xiaori is not in the habit of surrendering easily. You must know that after Xiao Ri surrendered in the face of his opponent, he tortured and killed prisoners of war and prisoners, so they thought that as long as they surrendered, the end would be extremely miserable.

"Shift!"

As the main rudder of the Ma Yun began to turn, Ma Yun aimed its side at the new ship of the Ning Navy, and the ten side guns on the Wuwei ship aimed at the new ship of the Ning Navy.

"Five hundred meters!"

"300 meters"

Ma Yun delivered the most threatening blow to the battleship of the Ning Navy, ten guns fired a salvo, but it was a pity that these little days the pirates fired not solid shells, but grapeshot.

Grape bullets, which are bundled into a bunch with a net bag, are very similar to a bunch of grapes, hence the name grape bullets. Although the firing range is not as good as that of solid bullets, a single shot fired at close range can instantly knock down dozens of enemy soldiers, and in naval battles, it can knock down a large number of enemy officers and sailors, so as to achieve the purpose of paralyzing enemy ships.

In naval warfare, the correct use of grapeshots was to paralyze the sailors and soldiers on enemy ships before jumping into the gang.

Hundreds or hundreds of small grapeshot bullets were like shotguns, setting off a wild flight on the new ship of the Ning Navy, making the sails crackle and digging out many holes, and seven of the soldiers of the Ning Navy Naval Division on the deck were directly killed and more than a dozen were injured......

The damage caused by this cannon to the new ship of the Ning Navy was nothing more, and this cannon made Li Zhixiang and the sailors and soldiers on the new ship furious.

The six three-inch guns in the bow of the ship fired a salvo, and the six flowering shells opened fire at a distance of about two hundred and fifty meters from the Ma Yun, this time the Ma Yun was unlucky to go to his grandmother's house, four of the shells hit directly, and four huge orange-red fireballs rose into the air on the Ma Yun.

The shock wave of four huge cannonballs tore the entire Wuwei ship apart, and with the sound of large bursts of flames and explosions, the Ma Yun disappeared directly from the sea, and the four flowering shells plus the gunpowder on the Ma Yun were like a volcanic eruption.

The Ma Yun exploded and sank, and one of the katanas was blasted into the new ship of the Ning Navy by the shock wave, and coincidentally, the knife slashed like shrapnel into the bow gun on the second deck, causing a consistent heavy blow to the gun barrel, although the gun left a gap about two inches long and about three points deep.

Li Zhixiang ordered this artillery not to be fired, and if it was hit hard, if the artillery exploded, it would be a lot of fun.

The shipbuilding technicians on the new ship recorded: "Don't fire a cannon within 250 meters, it is easy to cause accidental injury!" ”

With the sinking of the five small day battleships, the morale of the soldiers of the Ning Navy was greatly boosted: "Lord Li, this cannon is too easy to use!" ”

"Do you still need to say it?"

"Shall we apply to Cheng Shuai to replace all naval guns with this kind of rear-loading smoothbore guns?"

"It's a must!"

Li Zhixiang said: "We should also equip some tiger squat guns!" ”

"What are you doing with that thing, it's not far away, and the infantry is not uncommon with this kind of artillery!"

"The infantry army is not rare, it doesn't mean that we are useless, if we do it within a range of more than two hundred meters, give such a guy to the pirates of the little day, enough for them to drink a pot!"

Li Zhixiang was also very helpless, because the ten shotguns of Ma Yun's guns caused some damage to the sails of this new ship, and more importantly, they did not go to sea to fight, but sea trials, and the shells on the battleship were almost exhausted.

However, the gunboats of the Ning Navy Naval Division who came later began to salvage the small day warriors who fell into the water, not to mention that the number of these small days is really a lot, after half an hour of salvage, more than 400 chickens were rescued on the ship.

Among them is also one of Kato's sixteen generals, the Nine Ghosts Hirotaka, but with Kato Kiyomasa participated in the Korean War, and in the war, participated in the Battle of Ulsan Bay, the nineteen-year-old Nine Ghosts Hirotaka escorted Kato Kiyomasa to break through the blockade of the Ming army, forcibly rushed into the island and mountain castle, and made great contributions.

Now fifty-three-year-old Nine Ghost Guanglong has a violent temper, and the first moment he was rescued on the ship, he shouted: "I am Nine Ghost Guanglong, who will dare to fight with me!" ”

No one in the Ning Navy can understand Xiaori's language, but although the language is not understood, the arrogant appearance of the Nine Ghosts Guanglong, and the ghost screams, don't think about it with your head, think with your knees, and know that there are no good words in his mouth.

The Ning Navy soldier was very angry, he didn't say a word, he took a crossbow or a firearm, and shot at the Nine Ghosts Guanglong.

Immediately there was an extra sieve on the deck, and yes, he had become a sieve.

Li Zhixiang returned to Lushun Port, only then did he know that Cheng Shijie was looking for him, and he and Shen Shikui hurriedly went to Jinzhou.

And sent the warship this time, as well as the sea trial report of the new ship, for the sea trial of the new ship, the effect is still good, this new ship has been unanimously approved by the officers and men of the naval division of the Ning Navy.

Thanks to the results of this naval battle, the new ship was named: "Sea Shark class".

Cheng Shijie ordered the Lushun Shipyard to build the first batch of Sea Shark-class ships with a total of eight ships, not because he didn't have the strength to build more, but because the artillery couldn't keep up.

The production speed of rear-loading smoothbore guns is not fast, you must know that a Sea Shark-class battleship needs to be equipped with one hundred and ninety-two guns, and you must know that the artillery of the Ning Navy also needs a large number of artillery, which inevitably leads to a dispute between sea and land.

After arranging the production task, Cheng Shijie noticed that the problem he wanted to solve had been solved.

"Are you saying that these five ships were done by pirates in the small days?"

"That's right, we've captured more than 400 Little Day pirates!"

Cheng Shijie frowned and said, "What are you doing captive these little dwarfs?" ”

"Dashuai, I think so, these little dwarfs have been begging for a living at sea for a long time, and they are proficient in naval warfare, so they have been incorporated into ......"

Cheng Shijie didn't have a good impression of the pirates in the small days, he said directly: "You are not afraid of them......"

"They're not five feet tall, what are they afraid of doing?"

"Most of them are......"

"?"

When Li Zhixiang understood what a was, he immediately shook his head and said, "Throw them all into the sea and drown!" ”

"They can swim!"

"Tie them with a hundred pounds of stones, and if they can still swim up, count them awesome!"

Cheng Shijie continued: "Did you sink all the blacktail ships this time?" ”

"Seventeen, all of them are blacktails!"

Shen Shikui smiled bitterly: "The characteristics of the blacktail boat are obvious, we will definitely not admit mistakes!" ”

Song Xiance said with a gloomy face: "This is going to be against Zheng Zhilong!" ”

Cheng Shijie said solemnly: "No matter what Zheng Zhilong and Zheng Zhihu are, the sea is the lifeblood of Liaodong, and our own lifeblood can only be in our own hands." ”

"That's what I said, but the problem is that I'm afraid that Zheng Zhilong won't ...... easily"

Cheng Shijie shook his head and said: "Iron also needs to be hard, as long as we are strong enough, Zheng Zhilong will also be pleasant, if we are weak, then we deserve to be beaten, if we don't want to be beaten, then practice our skills hard, we must strengthen maritime patrols, from the north of Shanghai, as long as they cross the line, they will beat his mother!" ”

"Yes!"

Cheng Shijie thought for a while and said: "We are now seriously lacking in sea power, so we will continue to expand the shipyard, the expansion of the Lushun shipyard is meaningless, and the eight giant docks are enough, so build a new shipyard in the east port of Jinzhou, and build eight large docks like the Lushun shipyard to ensure that the speed of our shipbuilding must keep up!" ”

"The speed of shipbuilding can be increased, but the problem is artillery!"

"The cannon foundry should also be expanded, and the artillery will be given priority to the supply of the navy!"

At present, for the Ning Navy in Liaodong, Jiannu is not a threat for the time being, and the only threat comes from the sea, from the Zheng family's pirate group.

To prevent Zheng Zhilong from making trouble, he can only arrange patrols for the Ning Navy to expand the patrol range. If you want to exterminate a group of pirates at sea, if you don't have reliable information, you can only hit a dead mouse with a blind cat.

The matter of piracy also reminded Cheng Shijie that the matter of the strategic reserve grain warehouse was urgent, and when Cheng Shijie was preparing to establish a strategic grain reserve warehouse system in Liaodong, there was one thing that he had to come forward to receive.

This time he came to Liaodong was Li Wang, the son of Zhaoxian of North Korea (the original word sounded Wang, which could not be typed), he was the eldest son of Li Liang, and was named the son of the world in the fifth year of the Apocalypse.

As the prince of North Korea came to Liaodong, Cheng Shijie naturally needed to come out to receive him, after all, Zaiji, he was also the prince, with a different identity, and accompanied Zhaoxian Shizi to play in Liaodong for a few days, and the officials accompanying Zhaoxian Shizi vaguely proposed to Song Xiance that they wanted to purchase Liaodong-style armor and weapons and equipment.

For North Korea, the armor produced in Liaodong is not only of good quality and strong defense, but the key is that the manufacturing price is lower than that of their own creation, especially the defense capability, there is no way to compare.

Cheng Shijie was naturally very welcome to the door-to-door business, and to Cheng Shijie's great surprise, the purchase of armed equipment was only pediatric, but the larger purchase orders were luxury goods, such as four-wheeled luxury four-wheeled carriages, silk, gold, and jewelry.

In fact, although there are more than a dozen textile factories of various sizes in Liaodong, which produce wool cloth, cotton cloth, linen cloth, kudzu cloth, canvas and other fabrics and clothing, but do not produce silk, which is mainly for the needs of Liaodong, mainly cash crops.

Many people don't know that the products in Liaodong, North Korea have been selling well, whether it is porcelain, furniture, and of course, luxury four-wheeled carriages, which have bridge shock absorption and spring shock absorption systems, as well as bearings and steering mechanisms, which have some technological content.

Most importantly, North Korea demanded that the carriages be made of good wood and inlaid with gold, copper, silver, and various precious stones. Due to the addition of too many luxury goods, such carriages are actually very expensive, as high as 6,000 taels of silver for one car, and the DPRK purchased 50 in one go.

Looking at the wealthy purchasing group, Cheng Shijie sighed that North Korea is really rich, or rather, the North Korean royal family is really rich, and the strange thing is that they spent 350,000 taels of silver on the purchase of weapons and equipment, but they spent 300,000 taels of silver on the purchase of carriages, including other luxury goods, and the total purchase price was as high as more than 1 million taels of silver.

Then these orders became part of the weapons and equipment, as for the return of the son of North Korea's Zhao Xian to North Korea, how to explain that the price of weapons purchased by North Korea will be so expensive, it is not within Cheng Shijie's consideration, people spend their own money, Cheng Shijie can't care.

Immigration work is the focus of Liaodong's development, but as the population of Liaodong has exceeded 3 million, especially the land in the four prefectures of southern Liaoning is no longer much, except for the mandatory requirement to migrate to Liaoyang 15 Wei and 8 independent 1,000 households, most of the immigrants would rather want land that is not suitable for cultivation in southern Liaoning, rather than land in Liaozhongwei or Guangningwei.

The problem now is that there are too many places to spend money in Liaodong, and more investment is needed in education, and after the expansion of the Ning Navy, it also needs to carry out large-scale joint exercises, as well as the construction of roads and ditches, especially the need to build a new shipyard, expand new warships, and expand artillery factories, and there will inevitably be a serious shortage of funds.

To solve this problem, it is nothing more than open source and throttling.

However, Song Xiance proposed another way to let the farmers solve the problem of farm management on their own, and he proposed that the new immigrants could borrow money from the bank and then buy land from the management committee, and they would run their own business and be responsible for their own profits and losses.

Cheng Shijie frowned: "In this way, the risk is pressed on the people's heads, what ability do they have to resist the risk?" Now farming, not only do you need to work hard, but you also need to see if God gives face, and when you encounter natural and man-made disasters, isn't this forcing the people to hang themselves? ”

Song Xiance explained: "The meaning of the disciple is that on the basis of all this, it is all voluntary! ”

"Voluntary? You're not going to use coercion to get people to volunteer, are you? ”

In Cheng Shijie's view, this so-called voluntariness is actually not the real voluntariness of the people, and the "voluntary" under the threat of a knife is not only not good governance, but also a government that harms the people.

"Lord, among the current immigrants, there have been many self-cultivated farmers in order to avoid taxes, as well as small landlords, who have some savings, and they are not willing to be our military households."

The Tuntian military households are managed by the Ning Navy's agricultural reclamation company, which is responsible for providing seeds, farming tools and land, and arranging for the Tuntian military households to cultivate, of which 30% of the proceeds go to the Ning Navy's agricultural reclamation company.

However, with the passage of time, especially Cheng Shijie's heavy blow to Jiannu, Liaodong slowly stabilized, and at the same time, the taxes in various parts of the Central Plains became heavier and heavier, not to mention the fleeing of yeoman farmers, and even some small landlords could not bear it.

Those small landlords had no background, no background, and no tax exemption privileges, and the ordinary peasants belonged to stones and could no longer squeeze out the oil, so these gentry and officials set their sights on ordinary small landlords.

Despite their reluctance, these small landlords could only deal with the cheap price of their fields to the gentry who had connections and backgrounds, and some of the small landlords took refuge with relatives and friends, and those who had no way to do so had to go to Liaodong to try their luck.

At present, only military and martyr dependents have independent land in the land of Liaodong, and private individuals can only buy commercial land, which is not suitable for cultivation of sand and gravel land or alkaline wasteland.

However, the common people of the Ming Dynasty are too good at farming, just like Guo Changxi, a businessman in Guide Mansion, Henan, he was originally a cloth merchant, because there was no backstage, he was eaten by big fish and small fish, and he couldn't hold on, so he could only sell his ancestral house and shop, and came to Liaodong with a few hundred taels of silver.

Last year, there was a bumper harvest of potatoes and sweet potatoes in Liaodong, and he went with the flow, and then also purchased a batch of grinding machinery, preparing to open a mill to process potato flour.

He bought more than 150 acres of river beach land in the Kuanhe section of the Liao River, a tributary, to build a factory, but the problem was that when he was just about to start construction, he found that the mill was being built more and more, and the profits were getting thinner and thinner, and if he didn't do it well, he would lose money.

Guo Changxi found that the soil on his river beach was good, although most of it was full of stones, was this a problem? The dedication of the people of the Ming Dynasty to farming, not to mention just some stones, even if it is a stone mountain, if necessary, it can be moved away little by little, so this problem is not a problem at all for Guo Changxi.

Guo Changxi hired some homeless people to pick up stones on the river beach, and used the stones they collected to build a river embankment, and in this way, at the beginning of spring, he used the 150 acres of business under his name to plant wheat, soybeans, corn and other crops.

For Song Xiance, Guo Changxi is obviously exploiting the loopholes of the Liaodong Management Committee, and the commercial land he purchased was not used to build factories, but was transformed into fertile land, especially along the Kuanshui River, which is very convenient for irrigation.

Guo Changxi's success was immediately imitated by others, some of whom bought swamps in southern Liaoning and some of them bought hillside land.

Along the Kuanshui River, it has been transformed into a small town with six or seven thousand acres of fertile land, which has brought an income of fifty or sixty thousand taels of silver to the management committee.

(End of chapter)